


what is precious, what is fragile

by handschuhmaus



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Gender Changes, F/F, I wrote part of this instead of sleeping, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Mild Dumbledore Bashing, but it's based on what he actually did so
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-31
Updated: 2020-01-31
Packaged: 2021-02-27 13:22:15
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,204
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22047841
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/handschuhmaus/pseuds/handschuhmaus
Summary: obliged by a magical ailment to try to merge with the diary soul fragment (which was never destroyed), Voldemort discovers that there's another stay bit of her soul around... lingering in the forehead of her sixteen year-old arch-nemesis.exactly what was their enmity founded on, again?
Relationships: Harry Potter/Tom Riddle | Voldemort
Comments: 1
Kudos: 23
Collections: Flashing into the New Year





	what is precious, what is fragile

**Author's Note:**

  * In response to a prompt by [SolitaryEngel](https://archiveofourown.org/users/SolitaryEngel/pseuds/SolitaryEngel) in the [flashing_into_the_new_year](https://archiveofourown.org/collections/flashing_into_the_new_year) collection. 



> **Written for the prompt:**
> 
> Femslash please, but Dudeslash is also okay. Incredibly fluffy. Fluff me up. I'm divorced and gay and sad and I need something that will keep me fuzzy and warm. Either snake-face Voldemort or sexy Tom is okay. I'm kinda intrigued by the idea of a super protective, loving, cuddly, snake-face Voldy, tbh. Voldy/Tom killing a bunch of people to rescue or keep Harry safe is cool, if that sounds interesting to you, but I need the fluff more than the vigorous justice, haha.
> 
> \---
> 
> I'm probably meddling in something I have no business meddling in (as I, a) never quite entirely understood the nature of the collection but b) realize that finally completing/posting like. a month later was not so much the intent) but I was inspired by the prompt ...into something that may or may not be in any way satisfying? Not super shippy. ~~also I adore the Tamsin from Thomasine thing I found, it's... really nice! but I suppose it's probably a bit unusual in gender swaps~~

Tamsin Riddle (short for Thomasine, if you asked people more romantically minded than one Mrs. Cole) felt, acutely, both sixteen and seventy. It was probably making her more impulsive than usual, not to mention the internal confusion about how much she was Thomasine Riddle, Hogwarts student and hopeful future professor, and how much she was Voldemort, title made from the name her mother had left her, the only bequeathment, thinking she was a boy. (It had been altered for documents by a young aide at the orphanage, who was more romantically minded, to Thomasine Marvela, but she hadn't said about shortening it before leaving when Tom was all of ...six? How was it that was sixty years past and more rather than ten?!)

Not, mind, that she hadn't started going by Voldemort then, but Voldemort was an entire personality and was profoundly _not_ sixteen years old--except that she was. She kept thinking she'd find dark hair and a ...natural eye color (had her eyes been blue? It was so confusing; she didn't remember.) and, strangest of all, her nose, in her reflections. People took noses for granted, they really did! The slit, inhuman nostrils were probably the most forbidding part of her new face; baldness was fairly average, red eyes did happen naturally in at least some cases of albinism, and the slit pupils, well, yes they were not typically human, but they were a feature of housecats, one of the most adorable animals ever, plus some snakes, which were a personal favorite. (Cats did have the disadvantage of reminding her of Minerva McGonagall, which was much too unnecessarily complicated to be thinking of just now.)

The sixteen year old side of her had daft ideas--but then so did old ladies, sometimes, in her experience--like finding the names of Potter's relatives in the Prophet obituary, and finding their address in the telephone directory. 

But she probably wouldn't have done that, if it hadn't been for realizing her connection and part of her disadvantage with Potter probably arose from, pretty much accidentally splitting her soul up yet again that night, and somehow (she wasn't very sure) attaching it to the infant.

She would have to be dealt with, would Hadrianne Jamie Potter (the Potters, it seemed, had also wanted to name a son after the father, at least somewhat.)

Tamsin blamed the impulse to break in like some sort of petty burglar instead of ostentatiously blasting through old Dumbledore's obvious wards on the feeling sixteen again thing (well, that and being Slytherin rather than impulsive Gryffindor).

"What the hell?" Anne Potter demanded in a low voice, peering owlishly at her sworn enemy through the glasses she had just plucked off... the nightstand or something. "How did ...you get in here?" her teenage nemesis asked with slowly dawning horror.

Tamsin cast a non-verbal Lumos, intentionally not very strong, which gave the room the cast of candlelight, and brandished a lockpick she had conjured instead of answering. 

"I--I never thought I'd have to face you here," said Anne, half awake. "Did you kill the Dursleys?"

" _Why? Do you think I ought to be your personal contract killer?_ " Tamsin hissed, as much on impulse as anything. Anne, who was only...huh, about seven or eight months younger than half her consciousness, looked damnably adorable, hair mussed with sleep, wide and horror-stricken green eyes.

"I suppose the Ministry is already on their way," Anne reflected, not deigning to reply in Parseltongue. She finally grasped up her wand and held it up in a dueling position but (honorable Gryffindor not ...shooting first?) waited.

" _I have a proposal, actually_ ," said Voldemort, in the language of snakes, because it only seemed proper. 

"And what-- _sorry, what is that_?" Anne answered, wand still raised. Tamsin was beginning to think that, despite the presence of family, all the locks on this and only this door, and the bars on the window did not reflect a happy upbringing, anymore than Cole's Orphanage. Foolish Muggles.

"The reason why we share a language is, in fact, that you have some of my soul. In your scar." This time it's Tamsin who reverted to English, lest the concept of soul translate poorly to snakes, or be misunderstood.

Anne huffed. "That doesn't make me evil."

"What makes anyone evil?" Tamsin asked in disgust.

"Oh, maybe going around killing people?" Anne answered, sarcastically.

She sneered. "Clearly Dumbledore only thinks that the end result and not the beginning. Anyway, I want to take you into protective custody. "

"Protective custody?!" Anne spluttered, a little louder than before. "But you're the one trying to kill me!"

"Alright, but if we ignore that for a moment, does Dumbledore's behavior strike you as very safe for you?" It was becoming increasingly clear to Voldemort that despite lauding her mortal enemy as a hero, the greater part of the injustice that was returning her to Cole's Orphanage (and hence the Blitz, but the Muggles hadn't got a European war on at the moment, so the nearest equivalent was in fact the magical war.) was in its essentials being revisited upon Hadrianne Potter by one meddling, masterminding, Albus Dumbledore. It was "no better than Thomasine deserved", but it was probably "good for Harrie's character." (Quirrel had easily learned that Dumbledore settled on that shortening, despite no one else using it.) It didn't matter which side you fell on, apparently; by Dumbledore's standards you deserved abysmal treatment. Maybe the man was, ironically, prejudiced against half-bloods.

"Aren't you the pot calling the kettle black?" Anne retorted.

Tamsin had to think rapidly, shuffling through mental files, to parse that idiom. "Look, I'm decently certain no one told Dumbledore that I or you were destined to be his mortal enemy."

"He's--" Anne began, but only got an expression of disgust. "Stop deflecting blame."

"No. He's treating you in a way that does not suit the guardian of one of my soul pieces,"--nevermind her own destructive streak--"and I propose taking you into my protective custody."

"What exactly does protective custody entail?" Anne asked, looking at her with decided skepticism.

Tamsin answered wryly, aware that this was probably going to rouse only more suspicion and sounded uncharacteristic. "I make sure no one injures you."

"Including you," Anne said, not really a question, but certainly disbelieving.

Tamsin nodded vigorously and grinned. Had she really been this... cheery as a sixteen year old? Honestly she didn't think the diary horcrux had acted like this. Maybe elation was a side effect of (at least attempted) re-absorption of horcruxes, or reuniting of them in the same room or... But what else were you to do when... the best description they'd come up with was "your soul fragment is/was cursed"?

"I don't suppose I can leverage this to protect anyone else?" Anne wondered, pointedly. 

Continuing in her unaccustomed cheerfulness, Voldemort invited "Try me."

"Well. If I go with you, you can't hurt the Grangers, or the Weasleys. In fact, if I thought I could get away with it, don't hurt any current Hogwarts students, seeing as you don't want to hurt the Slytherins anyway. Also I don't quite think you should kill the Dursleys." The youthful face twisted into a grimace in the low light. "But know that I don't quite believe you're going to accept my conditions."

Tamsin giggled, despite the fact that it was wildly inappropriate--again, elation. Wars were neater without civilian involvement, but very little she could do short of messy war had seemed to make much impression on the magical establishment, in terms of safeguarding her life and allowing her her ambitions. However, Anne Potter would probably be good leverage, so long as Dumbledore carried on thinking that they were mortal enemies. 

Which meant... "Okay then. Also, we're going shopping first thing tomorrow morning." They could hardly expect to escape notice visiting Diagon Alley or Hogsmeade--again, Tamsin Riddle was profoundly unwelcome in the community that both insisted she enter it and made her largely unsuitable for escaping from it, all issues of prejudice aside. So a Muggle store it would be.

" _Shopping?!_ " Anne repeated, her voice affected by her confusion and or disbelief at this.

Tamsin elaborated without particular emotion. "I refuse to have the host of part of my soul going around in Muggle rags."

The Gryffindor protested this, slouching on her bed and looking decidedly young in her over-sized t-shirt."I never asked to host your soul!"

Voldemort did not really have a good response to this, so she shrugged and offered, "They can be Muggle clothes, and in fact probably will be because I don't want Dumbledore to know we've, uh..."

"Teamed up?" Anne suggested, with a note of irony. 

"If you like," Tamsin said, and shrugged again. She was doing a lot of shrugging. "If you must know, I'm merged with the, ah, the diary, and it's... sort of disorienting."

That did not escape Dumbledore's misused protege. "'You're merged'," Anne echoed flatly. "Do you mean you're considering ... _merging_ with me?"

"I don't think it works like that. Also, I split my soul in an attempt at insuring my immortality. I did what I just did out of desperation and would mostly prefer to still have the pieces of my soul around."

"Like--like they're IKEA furniture you don't want to be assembled at the moment?" Anne sputtered.

Tamsin's reaction flashed through indignation to confusion (...what was IKEA? and then she decided it didn't matter) to amusement. It was, ultimately, a strange but apt summation of circumstances. But for the sake of her dignity, she only asked, a note of unsuppressible laughter in the words, "What's IKEA?"

"It's...some kind of furniture store. Hermione said it was interesting. I haven't been, I mean the Dursleys wouldn't take me anywhere."

"That's that, then. We are going to go get some late night food, and first thing in the morning we will get you some proper clothes and then look up and visit IKEA, if that is at all possible."

Potter rose from her bed. "We're going to--we're going to go to a _diner_?" The topic seemed to have reminded Anne that they were still in the Dursley house (although, actually, Tamsin had had the foresight both to send a mild sleeping compulsion toward the Dursleys and send up an eavesdropping ward), for she adopted a hushed voice, but Tamsin would also swear that the tone indicated a "being invited and actually having the real prospect of going on a typical teenage experience" excitement/disbelief, one she had also felt before.

On a strange impulse, Voldemort enfolded the teen in her arms. It seemed like something Anne would do, even though very few people had really touched Tamsin at all back in her Hogwarts days. Potter stiffened, stared awkwardly at her inasmuch as it was possible at this angle, and then awkwardly reciprocated into the hug. It was... cozy. Furthermore, as sturdy a person as Anne acted, Tamsin was pretty sure she was small for her age (like Tamsin had been, once) and the sort of wary that came with avoiding bullies and their ilk. Outrageous! Voldemort was the only person allowed to mistreat her sworn enemy, even though as of now she was leaning towards not actually mistreating Anne Potter or even being sworn enemies any longer, seeing as Anne was actually relatively likable and had never gotten the option of _not_ being her sworn enemy.

Voldemort confirmed it. "Yes. We are definitely going to a diner. Knight Bus?"

"There are wizarding diners?"

Tamsin could only shrug. "Actually, I don't know where any are. I haven't really been to one and my knowledge of London eateries is years out of date." It was a matter-of-fact statement, but for some reason, this of all things made Anne Potter look at Voldemort with new eyes. Maybe it had finally dawned on her that Tamsin had not led a life of pureblood privilege pre-Hogwarts and that, in fact, thanks to Dumbledore, they shared a past of some deprivation. In fact, Voldemort very, very briefly wondered if this could have been Dumbledore's intent before deciding that firstly, even he couldn't come up with a plan like that, and even if he had it was still a remarkably stupid plan. 

Taking Anne Potter as her own did not mean that Voldemort was going over to the Gryffindor side, and Anne hadn't even listed Dumbledore as a top priority for preservation. In fact, maybe she could be coaxed into an interest in ousting the abuse-enabling headmaster from society's good graces... But that would come after the late night meal (dinfast? teast? breakper? Definitely the teenager in the diary.) and the shopping (proper clothes! Perhaps Anne would find it endearing) and IKEA, whatever that might be (who left their furniture in disassociated pieces anyway? that was a silly strategy for furniture, which was not at all like souls and didn't function in fragments and... okay, maybe there was a point to that, but she wasn't going to try to extract the soul piece from Anne, at least not now, considering it might hurt her and she wasn't sure she understood properly the process of reuniting with the other pieces.)...

**Author's Note:**

> ...idk there is some remote chance I will take up writing the trip to the diner (which is possibly a glaring Americanism anyway. but it's fluff!) or the clothing store or IKEA ~~(and I actually haven't researched IKEA's European presence in modern day let alone the mid to late nineties)~~
> 
> but uh... I make no promises.


End file.
